Edificio GP

Mateo Soto

• Architects

GP is located in a traditional neighborhood in Medellin, Colombia, in the river valley, and surrounded by low-density projects. The building is located at La Aguacatala which was originally conceived for single-family homes but transformed later into an institutional and service sector. GP is aware of this, and its architecture, without denying its corporate purpose shows a response to its surroundings. The reinterpretation of the way of inhabiting, of the domesticity in a higher density construction. The façade exposes the brick in its natural way. Concrete and metal were chosen with the utter purpose of expressing traditional constructive systems used in the city. Medellin’s colors assemble the ones of bricks. This building is developed under the condition of a party wall site on 3 of its sides. This created the necessity of moving the building away from its neighbors and appreciating the visuals in its interior.

This was the architectural strategy from which the project developed imbricated volumes, which moved apart from one another to create internal gardens. Vegetation is the fourth material and its contribution is intangible, but it's necessary to recognize that the tropic is responsible for creating its surroundings. The distribution in its interior is logical: a ground floor where the lobby and common use spaces like the auditorium and recreation gardens for workers are found. Superior levels hold private spaces, which are constituted of offices and a rooftop that transforms into an observatory of the city, which scenery is pure landscape.

The tropic’s architecture is distinguished for generating transition spaces and bioclimatic strategies are nurtured from this. The sun hits the building upfront. Because of this, sun breakers and vegetation are used in its façade. Also, cross ventilation is achieved through open plant spaces, and energy use is provided by solar panels which are located on the rooftop.

In its interior, we find a project which looks to reinterpret corporate architecture. Conventional office layout goes against everything learned through the pandemic. We are digital nomads and inhabiting and working are detachable, so GP’s design found a way of being cozy and domestic: terracotta-colored, noble materials and allowing the metallic structure of being the main character. This building achieves to be constructive, programmatic, and socially efficient. With simple geometries, traditional construction, and a new interpretation of the domestic. GP is the result of reinterpreting the inheritance of its surroundings, being a critic in its shapes, and building a temporal validity of a society that is always changing, which is migratory and in constant transformation.